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A Chat with John Trapani, Appian’s Newest Financial Services Leader

Courtney Heinbach, Content Marketing Manager
June 22, 2022

Financial services organizations, like those across many other industries, struggle with systemic issues brought on by disjointed, outdated core technologies. That’s why Appian serves the financial services industry—to deliver solutions that minimize the strain those issues cause. To best serve industries’ unique needs, Appian invests in experts with years of first-hand experience.

We sat down with John Trapani, our newest financial services Industry Leader, to introduce him to Appian customers and community members and welcome him to the team.

Q: Hello, John! Thanks for meeting with us. Can you tell us about your work experience, your most recent role, and your relationship with Appian prior to joining our team?
A: Good to be here! I’ve been developing software for over 30 years—the first 12 years of my career were spent at small software companies, with a three-year stint at a management consulting firm. I joined Fitch Ratings in 2001 to take over their small application development team, and I departed as Managing Director responsible for all core analytical platforms. I became an Appian customer to help transform how our team delivered value to our business partners, so I know exactly what our financial customers can glean from the Appian platform.

Q: So what brings you to the Appian financial services team?
A: After seeing first-hand the impact that Appian can have at a financial organization, I became convinced that low-code is the future of corporate software development. Having spent a career building solutions by hand, I appreciate how the Appian Low-Code Platform can shrink the time and effort required to solve complex business problems. The opportunity to be something of an evangelist for the platform was too good to pass up. It’s something I believe in strongly.

Q: How have you seen financial services organizations benefit from low-code applications?
A: There are many, but some of the most impactful that I’ve experienced are the rapid rate at which financial teams see value—the software solutions are easy to build and are delivered quickly. Low-code applications are easy to change and not only allow, but encourage organizations to adapt, since change is inevitable. Another benefit is the minimization of complexity. Low-code enables teams to incur less technical debt during the creation and deployment of applications. And finally, accessibility—resources and team members of all levels of experience can make meaningful contributions to an application, which greatly alters the trajectory for how you structure your teams.

Q: What are your goals for supporting Appian financial services customers in the first year?
A:  First off, I plan to do a lot of listening. While there are absolutely common threads of interest across capital markets customers, each firm has specific needs and motivations. Taking the time to understand what a customer needs is an important first step. More specifically, I would like to leverage my many years of experience in software development to help customers find ways to maximize the value of their investment in the Appian platform.  Appian is great at solving large, complex problems across an organization. I plan to help customers make the transition from their initial successful deployment to using Appian as an engine for value creation across their firm. Part of this transition can involve helping customers with a strategy to develop a center of enablement within their organization. Such a function can help to amplify the benefits of the Appian platform, create a robust environment for ongoing innovation, and aid the identification and prioritization of problems best suited to solving with Appian.

Q: What is your favorite thing about low-code?
A: Low-code fundamentally changes how software engineers approach their work. With traditional solutions, engineers have to think a lot about how they will solve a problem. But with low-code, you can focus more energy on delivering business value. This results in the faster time to value that I believe is a core strength of low-code and Appian in particular.

Q: Give us one prediction for the financial services industry.
A: As firms face challenges from increased competition, regulatory scrutiny, and rising costs, cloud adoption will accelerate. Using Appian as a lever to accelerate cloud migration and maintain a competitive advantage will become an area of focus for our financial customers in the coming years. 

Q: What’s the coolest place you’ve visited, for work or pleasure?
A: A close call with Paris, but Bengaluru, India is really something. It’s a massive, sprawling city that despite its density manages to be a functioning metropolis and a global hub for technologists, wrapped around cultural sites, and its citizens offer incredible hospitality.

Please join us in welcoming John to the Appian financial services team!